Google is now depositing its Wallet funds at the FDIC. British Airways paying 1 million pounds a year for a single door at Heathrow. Turkish Airlines wants pilots to get married for safety. Plus bonus miles and the ethics of credit cards…
Austin is on the verge of adopting new rules that could kill off great barbecue inside the city.
Southwest Airlines has hired an investment bank to help evaluate options for its co-brand credit card. Southwest Airlines is considering replacing JPMorgan Chase as the issuer of its credit card rewards program, according to two people familiar with the matter. One of those people said Southwest has hired investment bank First Annapolis as an adviser as it reviews the relationship with Chase. Who could Southwest rope into making a credible offer for their co-brand franchise? Does Citi have the juice to pick up a second Dallas-based airline, after shooting the moon on Costco? American Express can’t possibly make sense for an airline that pitches itself as discount, and of the people, even in a world where Amex co-brands with Walmart and Target. Barclaycard lost US Airways and clearly needs a prize airline. Southwest’s relationship would…
I love many things about American Airlines. First and foremost is the AAdvantage program, and especially that I’m well taken care of as an Executive Platinum member (100,000 mile flyer). Their lounge agents have been exceptionally good to me during irregular operations. I even like their revenue management, which doesn’t release all first class seats into upgrade a day before departure. When a flight irregularity happens, and I get put onto another flight, it’s even still possible to get an upgrade (and more frequently happens than not). If there were two things I would change about the operation, I would actually bundle them together and call them American’s Goldilocks Problem: they start boarding too early, before scheduled time, and they notify passengers of delays.. in creeping fashion.. usually only after a boarding or departure time…
I’m at Frequent Traveler University by the Dallas airport (at the Hyatt Regency DFW).
And since I’m living in Austin now I decided, why not just commute?
Flights go for as little as $64 each way as long as you’re buying them in advance when flights aren’t full and it isn’t an event week(end). That meant I could fly from Austin to Dallas and back for less than the cost of a hotel night at the group rate…
Find out what the latest Southwest devaluation means for your points.
An air marshal left a loaded gun in a Newark airport bathroom. We already know that air marshalls schedule their work assignments to facilitate vacations and sexual trysts, and are insufficiently trained to do much even if something did happen on their watch. But this isn’t good. A federal air marshal left his loaded gun in a bathroom stall at Newark Liberty International Airport, then boarded a flight he was assigned to protect without it, NJ Advance Media has learned. The incident occurred late last month, when the marshal left the handgun on top of a toilet paper dispenser in the public men’s room near Checkpoint 2 in Terminal C (HT: Brian Sumer)
IHG Rewards Club is about to launch their next promotion and it’s more lucrative than things first appeared. It sounded complicated with earning and gifting but truth is you can gift to yourself and double your earnings. This is how it will work.
Citibank and Visa have stolen the Costco relationship away American Express, which has been the exclusive card product at the wholesaler’s stores in the US for 16 years. Details of the deal have finally come out, and we can see just how badly Citi let itself get creamed to do so.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
